Tim's the only one who actually swam. Sorry, ladies...the man wore a proper suit, thus foiling any wooly water nymph photo opportunities. If you wanted a picture of Tim wang you shoulda' been in the Chelsea Saturday night with a camera and quick reflexes, reflexes capable of overcoming shock fascination. I got in a lot to move the boat off of rocks and ridges--the water was warmer than I would've thought--but didn't really feel the need to dip until it was too dark and, by then, I was a little fuzzy headed.
I assembled the tent while Whit and Tim scoured the immediate portion of our scrubby rock for driftwood. The little rock and what feisty scrub managed to cling to dirt in the crags of stones and ridges looked tortured by the most recent high water. The split, dried boughs of scraggly trees yielded little for the fire. We agreed to go on a wood run just down the river on a larger adjacent outcropping that looked like it had some bigger snags holding more fuel.
While I fiddled with my new El-Cheapo brand camp stove a fierce wind blew up. Frothing white caps coming from the south swirled the water with a cottony texture that never quite reached us but the wind that caused them did threaten to take our unfettered tent away. The boys quickly filled the tent with our riggings and some stones then staked the tent off properly--something I should've done but was thinking food, food, food for some intoxicating reason. The wind came and went, our little campsite blessedly shielded well by a line of islands just to the east of us.
It was time for food.
We wanted to eat fish, a catch reeled in by our guile and the stupidity of lesser members of this planet's food chain, but that just wasn't in the cards. My back-up plan was four generous filet cuts from a large buck dropped by my secretary's husband last deer season in Moore County. I sliced three large red peppers and sauteed them in butter and chipotle chili powder with the filets. Since Tim was kind enough to build a fire, I wrapped three ears of corn individually in heavy foil with butter and sea salt, pepper, and some thyme, and tossed them in the burned down coals of the fire.
Behind us is the small and shallow swimming channel Tim lounged in when we first arrived. The island in the distance over my left shoulder is Skull Island where we used to summer as a family.
Sundown. I'll tell you more later, but for now, we need fire.